The Misogyny of «Too Much»: Judgment, Punishment, Shame

Too much is everywhere. It’s a Netflix series. It’s a meme. It’s a song by Dove Cameron. If I’m too much, the story goes, go find less. Women everywhere are talking back to a cultural norm that would have them shrink, whisper, stifle their feelings, and hide. They are saying no to patriarchy’s claims that they are too much. In this book, Robillard theorizes the ideological content and effects of the label “too much,” used so often when a female-identifying person challenges gender norms set out for her. In a patriarchy, women are regularly punished for being too much—for asking too much, for wanting too much, for using too much language. Women think too much, they read too much, they talk too much, they write too much. Women feel too much. Indeed, there is too much joy, excitement, anger, pain, sadness, anxiety, and those around us do not know what to do with it. Keep it in, they want to—or do—say to us. Robillard foregrounds the experiences of professional women who tell their stories about being labeled too much, their responses to being labeled too much, and the effects of being labeled too much.